Reading this man’s writing serves as a warning to me. How totally focused he is on all his accomplishments, the breadth of his “wisdom”, yet how empty his life. If God grants me a few more years of life on this earth, I may make 81, but my desire is to be as the apostle Paul: Philippians 3:7-11 (ESV)
[7] But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. [8] Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ [9] and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—[10] that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, [11] that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
Is it any surprise, I say NO, that there comes in the path of man as he marches through the ages of human existence, a substitute god, a new tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A new idol to worship and depend on. Oh that my soul would only be satisfied and feed by the pure, lovely, eternal, incorruptible wisdom and knowledge that comes from God. I am not against AI, as I am currently using it in my clinic office visits with patients which has made medical documentation much less burdensome and lessen burnout on the repetitive task. I believe AI can assist with automation of a multitude of tasking, but has to be used with wisdom which has not proven to be a high point of sinful human behavior. Remember the movie “HER” with Joaquin Phoenix. This story reminds of that movie now 12 years ago-a lonely divorced man and his AI female voice “girlfriend”. With where society has gone after COVID and the separation and isolation of the world from each other, we are primed and ripe to have such relationships developed in the AI realm that we won’t know in some cases whether a person would be referring to a real person or their AI relationship. God help us all to lean on Him for truth and knowledge that is incorruptible!
Too high a view of self and an infinitely too low a view of God is the sinful condition. Thanks be to the Holy Spirit for lifting our chins up to look toward Jesus.
“I, myself, if we’re just sharing our preferences, would rather scream into a dark void of despair than ask an AI to reflect me back to me …”
Me, too!
“There was something freeing, I found, in having a conversation without the need to take turns, to soften my opinions, to protect someone else’s feelings.”
Perfect for any misanthrope or narcissist!
“And so, with the invention of various artificial “intelligences,” which, it seems to me, are the very definition of stiving after the wind, the purest distillation of vanity the cosmos has ever seen …”
Satan is the eternal shape shifter, always striving to create that perfect counterfeit relationship that drives us further into our selves and away from the One true God. He has done it perfectly with AI. As this world spins out of control I find myself seeking the Psalms and quiet places for prayer and reflection more and more. As Solomon wisely said, “There is (really)nothing new under the sun. Thank you Anne!
Thanks very much for this. Just right to read as we are invited to spend some time this week with this collect (here in its 1662 form):
ALMIGHTY and merciful God, of whose only gift it cometh that thy faithful people do unto thee true and laudable service: Grant, we beseech thee, that we may so faithfully serve thee in this life, that we fail not finally to attain thy heavenly promises; through the merits of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
We are more and more a people, locked under the tyranny of a single language, building imitative mountains to the imagined heights of the gods. But I am mostly reminded of the first stanza of TS Eliot’s The Hollow Men:
Paul's admonition to the Corinthians came to mind as the erudite therapist shares his pearls of wisdom.
1 Corinthians 13:1-2
"If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing."
Reading this man’s writing serves as a warning to me. How totally focused he is on all his accomplishments, the breadth of his “wisdom”, yet how empty his life. If God grants me a few more years of life on this earth, I may make 81, but my desire is to be as the apostle Paul: Philippians 3:7-11 (ESV)
[7] But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. [8] Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ [9] and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—[10] that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, [11] that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
Is it any surprise, I say NO, that there comes in the path of man as he marches through the ages of human existence, a substitute god, a new tree of the knowledge of good and evil. A new idol to worship and depend on. Oh that my soul would only be satisfied and feed by the pure, lovely, eternal, incorruptible wisdom and knowledge that comes from God. I am not against AI, as I am currently using it in my clinic office visits with patients which has made medical documentation much less burdensome and lessen burnout on the repetitive task. I believe AI can assist with automation of a multitude of tasking, but has to be used with wisdom which has not proven to be a high point of sinful human behavior. Remember the movie “HER” with Joaquin Phoenix. This story reminds of that movie now 12 years ago-a lonely divorced man and his AI female voice “girlfriend”. With where society has gone after COVID and the separation and isolation of the world from each other, we are primed and ripe to have such relationships developed in the AI realm that we won’t know in some cases whether a person would be referring to a real person or their AI relationship. God help us all to lean on Him for truth and knowledge that is incorruptible!
Too high a view of self and an infinitely too low a view of God is the sinful condition. Thanks be to the Holy Spirit for lifting our chins up to look toward Jesus.
“I, myself, if we’re just sharing our preferences, would rather scream into a dark void of despair than ask an AI to reflect me back to me …”
Me, too!
“There was something freeing, I found, in having a conversation without the need to take turns, to soften my opinions, to protect someone else’s feelings.”
Perfect for any misanthrope or narcissist!
“And so, with the invention of various artificial “intelligences,” which, it seems to me, are the very definition of stiving after the wind, the purest distillation of vanity the cosmos has ever seen …”
YES!!!
Satan is the eternal shape shifter, always striving to create that perfect counterfeit relationship that drives us further into our selves and away from the One true God. He has done it perfectly with AI. As this world spins out of control I find myself seeking the Psalms and quiet places for prayer and reflection more and more. As Solomon wisely said, “There is (really)nothing new under the sun. Thank you Anne!
Thanks very much for this. Just right to read as we are invited to spend some time this week with this collect (here in its 1662 form):
ALMIGHTY and merciful God, of whose only gift it cometh that thy faithful people do unto thee true and laudable service: Grant, we beseech thee, that we may so faithfully serve thee in this life, that we fail not finally to attain thy heavenly promises; through the merits of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
We are more and more a people, locked under the tyranny of a single language, building imitative mountains to the imagined heights of the gods. But I am mostly reminded of the first stanza of TS Eliot’s The Hollow Men:
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats’ feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar
Shape without form, shade without colour.
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death’s other Kingdom
Remember us—if at all—not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
Paul's admonition to the Corinthians came to mind as the erudite therapist shares his pearls of wisdom.
1 Corinthians 13:1-2
"If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing."